10 ms·
If your threat model includes the nation state where you physical infrastructure is, you're hosed.
by enkid 3y ago
If your threat model includes the nation state where you physical infrastructure is, you're hosed.
- api 3y agoLiterally hosed. There's a funny jargon term "rubber hose cryptography" that's used to refer to the cryptanalysis method where you beat someone with a rubber hose until they give you the key. It's 100% effective against all forms of cryptography including even post-quantum algorithms.
- dmayle 3y agoThat's actually not true. It can do nothing about M of N cryptography. (That's when a key is broken up such that there are N parts, and at least M (less than N) are required to decrypt. It doesn't matter how many rubber hoses you have, one person can fully divulge or give access to their key and it's still safe.
- jacquesm 3y agoSure, so you hit all of the people that have all of the pieces. Problem solved.
- saalweachter 3y agoOr you publicly announce you're hitting 1 of the N people with the rubber hose until M-1 of the other people send you their key fragments. It's not like these keys are shared among disinterested strangers who have no attachment to each other.
- worthless-trash 3y agoSomehow, somewhere you've just influenced a megacorp's internal crypto process.
- kyleplum 3y agoThat situation just requires a longer hose
- gabereiser 3y agoand more beatings.
- snoman 3y agoOr M hoses.
- hn_version_0023 3y agoI always giggle a little when really smart people forget thugs exist and do what they’re told. If that includes breaking the knees of M people to get what they’re after, then M pairs of knees are gonna get destroyed. This isn’t hard to understand, but it’s easy to forget our civilization hangs by a thread more often than any of us care to admit.
- ibejoeb 3y agoI don't remember the provenance of the quip, but somewhere at a def con or a hope, I heard, "The point of cryptography is to force the government to torture you."
- jacquesm 3y agoThey're perfectly ok with that, and depending on where you live this may happen in more or less overt ways. If the government wants your information, they will get your information. Your very best outcome is to simply rot in detention until you cough up your keys.
- ibejoeb 3y agoNow that I think about it, I'm pretty sure it was a session about root zone security, and Adam Langley was in the room. I was thinking, damn, kinda sucks to be the guy that holds Google's private keys. They want someone's information, so they let you rot...
- jazzyjackson 3y agopower in numbers can't torture us all!
- Randomizer42 3y agoThat’s hyperbole
- MichaelZuo 3y agoAny organization that is really really serious about security will obviously keep at least N-M +1 folks, along with their family, in other countries. Which is a much much higher bar to clear for any would be rubber hose attackers.
- pixl97 3y agoLets say for example Bob, Jon, and Tom have pieces of the key. Bob and Jon are in the US and arrested over and commanded by a court to give up the key. Tom is the holdout. The US will issue an international arrest warrant, and now Tom can never safely fly again or the plane will be diverted to the nearest US friendly airport where they will be extradited. So, yea, "safe" is very situational here.
- BurningFrog 3y agoDoesn't Tom's key fragment have to be on a disk somewhere for things to work? That's the actual weak link to attack.
- LinuxBender 3y agoThis probably works if each person has a cyanide+happy drug pill or a grenade and is willing to sacrifice themselves and the rubber-hoser(s). I think that requires a rare level of devotion. This process must also disable a simple and fragile signalling device to let the others know what's coming.
- ipaddr 3y agoYou would be surprised that for a percent this would not work. Some even like it. Some have a deathwish and want to be a martyr. Some people blow themselves up to further a cause. Also put under heavy stress memories of keys cannot be recalled at times. It's probably slightly less effective than threatening to kill family members but probably more than threat of jail time. Either way you require someone alive and with mental awareness. The mind reading tools found in science fiction hasn't been developed yet.
- jacquesm 3y agoWe're talking about normal people, not psychopaths.
- l33t7332273 3y agoTerrorists are generally highly altruistic, not psychopaths. It’s a lot easier to blow yourself up(or to spread ideology which encourages it)for a cause that you believe is helping people, in particular _your_ people.
- jacquesm 3y agoThe terrorists that blow themselves up and that blow other people up are usually misguided brainwashed angry young men. It's nothing to do with ideology, everything to do with power. Or did you think blowing up schools full of girls is something people genuinely believe helps their people, to give just one example? Ordinary people just want to be left alone. Old guys wishing for more power will use anything to get it, including sacrificing the younger generations.
- l33t7332273 3y ago> did you think blowing up schools full of girls is something people genuinely believe helps their people It absolutely is something that they think helps their people, yes.
- aborsy 3y agoThis would not work well, because you can’t do it in a secret manner. Overuse of the rubber hose cryptography will become known, and there will be public backlash.
- eastbound 3y agoSeems like the NSA is threatening everyone of arrest (=state-organized violence) if they don’t secretly give them keys, and Snowden revealed it, and there is no public backlash.
- amluto 3y agoHose-resistant cryptography is possible. Secret sharing comes to mind, or a system by which even the principals can only compromise a key slowly.
- vasco 3y agoI mean in the end everything is people just like Logan Roy said in Succession. Cryptography or any software protections are the same. It's a great quote that is very true: > "Oh, yes... The law? The law is people. And people is politics. And I can handle of people."
- outworlder 3y ago> If your threat model includes the nation state where you physical infrastructure is, you're hosed. True. But even if you trust your nation state 100%, having a backdoor means you now have to worry about it falling into the wrong hands.
- jacquesm 3y agoEven if you trust your nation state 100% having a backdoor means it has already fallen into the wrong hands. That's because 'nation state' is not synonymous with 'people running the nation state'.
- PeterStuer 3y agoAddendum: if your threat model includes any nation state that has significant ties to the nation state that hosts your physical or transit infrastructure, you're hosed.
- Obscurity4340 3y agoHow might this apply or what are the implications of Signal given its US jurisdiction?
- Natanael_L 3y agoSignal relies on the client program to not be compromised to keep conversations secret
- lmm 3y agoThe US authorities can make the same orders that they made with LavaBit (i.e. ordering them to produce a backdoored build and replace yours with it), and they can make them secretly. Given that Signal by design requires you to use it with auto-update enabled (and, notably, goes to some effort to take down ways of using it without auto-update), and has no real verification of those auto-updated builds, I would consider it foolish to rely on the secrecy of Signal if your threat model includes the US authorities or anyone who might be able to call in a favour with them.
- wildfire 3y agoHow odd. I have, and continue, to use Signal without auto-update enabled. I have been prompted, twice in three years to update though. Perhaps the requirement depends on your country?
- Obscurity4340 3y agoYa, does it do that thing banking apps do where it insists on the most recent version in order to even be usable? Otherwise, thats more of an iOS option that can be easily altered Settings < App Store < Automatic Downloads > App Updates